Boston Police have alerted us to three arrests made at Bartlett Yard in the wee hours of Friday morning. From the incident report:

...Officers Sanon and Lopes responded to the location and apprehended the three who were hiding within the bushes. Through a sweep of the immediate area of where the suspects were located, Officer Sanon located a gray/yellow backpack which was found hidden under the leaves containing ... tools, (electrical saw, electrical screw driver, sledgehammer, hammer, pried-bar...).

[Suspect 2] who was the first one to be apprehended uttered that they are graffiti artist they heard that this place (Bartletts Garage) was about to be teared down so they decided to come in to take down some of the most important art works so they can preserve them for history.

We're leaving the names of the three art-lovers out of this for now, although we will note that they were all men in their 30s, listed as "white non-hispanic" in the report, and none of them had home addresses inside Boston city limits.

We take it as a compliment and have been joking that we're in the same league as the Gardner Museum. We're also baffled as to how exactly one steals a brick wall.

Nevertheless, we're compelled to say this. This was a temporary experiment in art and community. Bartlett Yard is closed to the public. Our programming has concluded, and remediation activities are scheduled to begin in preparation for demolition early this winter. Entering the site during this remediation and demolition phase is not only dangerous, it's illegal, and you will be arrested if you are caught. That goes whether you are there to make art or to steal it.

As far as lamenting the loss of a place to make art, rest assured that we are working on several possibilities for the future, and that a wide variety of art and services for artists will be incorporated into the new development.